LAX-area powerplant goes 'green'

New technology at plant will decrease pollution

kabc

By ABC7

EL SEGUNDO (CNS) The old power plant in El Segundo was mothballed in 2003, but will be
refit with new equipment that will provide power to 400,000 residences and emit
30 percent less air pollution than the plant did when it was operated for
decades using older technology, officials said.

Once it is restarted in three years, the NRJ Energy Inc.-owned
electrical station will no longer suck in large amounts of seawater as coolant,
a process that kills plankton, fish eggs and microscopic organisms, officials
said.

Southern California Edison yesterday signed an agreement to buy the NRJ
plant's output for 10 years, company officials announced yesterday. The
agreement is subject to approval from state regulators, and Edison said it
expects that to be granted.

Natural gas for the electrical generation in California currently comes
from pipelines from Texas and Colorado, but two companies are applying for
permission to import natural gas in its liquefied form at offshore terminals in
Santa Monica Bay and near Oxnard.

The NRJ generating station is a longtime coastal landmark, one of two
sets of smokestacks along the beach between LAX and Manhattan Beach. The towers
may get torn down as a part of the project.